Visions Unfolding: Architecture in the
When I use the term 'vision' I
Age of Electronic Media ADSeptember-October 1992
During the 50 years since the Second World War, a paradigm shift has taken place that
should have profoundly affected architecture: this was the shift from the mechanical
paradigm to the electronic one. This change can be simply understood by comparing the
impact of the role of the human subject on such primary modes of reproduction as the
photograph and the fax; the photograph within the mechanical paradigm, the fax within
the electronic one.
in photographic reproduction the subject still maintains a controlled interaction with
the object. A photograph can be developed with more or less contrast, texture or clarity.
The photograph can be said to remain in the control of human vision. The human subject
thus retains its function as interpreter, as discursive function. With the fax, the subject
is no Ionger called upon to interpret, for reproduction takes place without any control or
adjustment. The faxalso challenges the concept of originality. While in a photograph the
original reproduction still retains a privileged value, in facsimile transmission the original
remains intact but with no differentiating value since it is no Ionger sent. The mutual
devaluation of both original and copy is not the only transformation affected by the
electronic paradigm. The entire nature of what we have come to know as the reality of
our world has been called into question by the invasion of media into everyday life. For
reality always demanded that our vision be interpretive.
How have these developments affected architecture? Since architecture has
traditionally housed value as weil as fact, one would imagine that architecture would have
been greatly transformed. But this is not the case, for architecture seems little changed
at all. This in itself ought to warrant investigation, since architecture has traditionally
been a bastion of what is considered to be the real. Metaphors such as hause and home,
bricks and mortar, foundations and shelter attest to architecture's role in defining what
we consider to be real. Clearly, a change in the everyday concepts of reality should have
had some effect on architecture. lt did not because the mechanical paradigm was the sine
qua non of architecture; architecture was the visible manifestation of the overcoming of
natural forces such as gravity and weather by mechanical means. Architecture not only
overcame gravity, it was also the monument to that overcoming; it interpreted the value
society placed on its vision.
The electronic paradigm directs a powerful challenge to architecture because it
defines reality in terms of media and simulation; it values appearance over existence, what
can be seen over what is. Not the seen as we formerly knew it, but rather a seeing that can
no Ionger interpret. Media introduce fundamental ambiguities into how and what we see.
Architecture has resisted this question because, since the importation and absorption of
perspective by architectural space in the 15th century, architecture has been dominated
by the mechanics of vision. Thus architecture assumes sight to be pre-eminent and also
in some way natural to its own processes, not a thing to be questioned. lt is precisely this
traditional concept of sight that the electronic paradigm questions.
Sight is traditionally understood in terms of vision.
mean that particular characteristic of sight which attaches seeing to thinking, the eye
to the mind. in architecture, vision refers to a particular category of perception linked
to monocular perspectival vision. The monocular vision of the subject in architecture
allows for all projections of space to be resolved on a single planimetric surface. lt is
therefore not surprising that perspective, with its ability to define and reproduce the
perception of depth on a two-dimensional surface, should find architecture a waiting
and wanting vehicle. Nor is it surprising that architecture soon began to conform itself
to this monocular, rationalising vision - in its own body. Whatever the style, space was
constituted as an understandable construct, organised araund spatial elementssuch as
axes, places, symmetries, etc. Perspective is even more virulent in architecture than in
painting because of the imperious demands of the eye and the body to orient itself in
architectural space through processes of rational perspectival ordering. lt was thus not
without cause that Brunelleschi's invention of one-point perspective should correspond
to a time when there was a paradigm shift from the theological and theocentric to
the anthropomorphic and anthropocentric views of the world. Perspective became
the vehicle by which anthropocentric vision crystallised itself in the architecture that
followed this shift.
Brunelleschi's projection system, however, was deeper in its effect than all subsequent
stylistic changes because it confirmed vision as the dominant discourse in architecture
from the 16th century to the present. Thus, despite repeated changes in style from the
Renaissance through Post-Modernism and despite many attempts to the contrary, the
seeing human subject- monocular and anthropocentric- remains the primary discursive
term of architecture.
The tradition of planimetric projection in architecture persisted unchallenged because
it allowed the projection and hence the understanding of a three-dimensional space in two
dimensions. in other disciplines- perhaps since Leibniz and certainly since Sartre- there
has been a consistent attempt to demonstrate the problematic qualities inherent in vision
but in architecture the sight/mind construct has persisted as the dominant discourse.
in an essay entitled 'Scopic Regimes of Modernity', Martin Jay notes that 'Baroque
visual experience has a strongly tactile or haptic quality which prevents it from turning
into the absolute ocular centrism of its Cartesian perspectivalist rival.' Norman Bryson, in
his article 'The Gaze in the Expanded Field', introduces the idea of the gaze (/e regard)
as the looking back of the other. He discusses the gaze in terms of Sartre's intruder in
Being and Nothingness or in terms of Lacan's concept of a darkness that cuts across the
space of sight. Lacan also introduces the idea of a space looking back which he likens to
a disturbance of the visual field of reason.
From time to time architecture has attempted to overcome its rationalising vision.
lf one takes for example the church of San Vitale in Ravenna, one can explain the
solitary column almost blocking the entry or the incomplete groin vaulting as an attempt
to signal a change from a Pagan to a Christian architecture. Piranesi created similar
effects with his architectural projections. Piranesi diffracted the monocular subject by
creating perspectival visions with multiple vanishing points so that there was no way of
correlating what was seen into a unified whole. Equally, Cubism attempted to deflect
the relationship between a monocular subject and the object. The subject could no
Ionger put the painting into some meaningful structure through the use of perspective.
Cubism used a non-monocular perspectival condition: it flattened objects to the edges, it
upturned objects, it undermined the stability of the picture plane. Architecture attempted
similar dislocations through Constructivism and its own, albeit normalising, version of
Cubism - the International Style. But this work only looked cubistic and modern, the
subject remained rooted in a profound anthropocentric stability, comfortably upright
and in place on a flat, tabular ground. There was no shift in the relationship between
the subject and the object. While the object looked different it failed to displace the
viewing subject. Though the buildings were sometimes conceptualised, by axonometric
or isometric projection rather than by perspective, no consistent deflection of the subject
was carried out. Yet Modernist sculpture did in many cases effect such a displacement of
the subject. These dislocations were fundamental to Minimalism: the early work of Robert
Morris, Michael Heizer and Robert Smithson. This historical project, however, was never
taken up in architecture. The question now begs to be asked: why did architecture resist
developments that were taking place in other disciplines? And further, why has the issue
of vision never been properly problematised in architecture?
lt might be said that architecture never adequately thought through the problern
of vision because it remained within the concept of the subject and the four walls.
Architecture, unlike any other discipline, concretised vision. The hierarchy inherent in
all architectural space begins as a structure for the mind's eye. lt is perhaps the idea
of interiority as a hierarchy between inside and outside that causes architecture to
conceptualise itself ever more comfortably and conservatively in vision. The interiority of
architecture more than any other discourse defined a hierarchy of vision articulated by
inside and outside. The fact that one is actually both inside and outside with architecture,
unlike painting or music, required vision to conceptualise itself in this way. As long as
architecture refuses to take up the problern of vision, it will remain within a Renaissance
or Classical view of its discourse.
Now what would it mean for architecture to take up the problern of vision? Vision
can be defined as essentially a way of organising space and elements in space. lt is a way
of looking at, and defines a relationship between a subject and an object. Traditional
architecture is structured so that any position occupied by a subject provides a means for
understanding that position in relation to a particular spatial typology, such as a rotunda,
a transept crossing, an axis, an entry. Any number of these typological conditionals deploy
architecture as a screen for looking at.
The idea of a 'looking back' begins to displace the anthropocentric subject. Looking
back does not require the object to become a subject, that is to anthromorphise the object.
Looking back concerns the possibility of detaching the subject from the rationalisation
of space. ln other words, to allow the subject to have a vision of space that no Ionger
can be put tagether in the normalising, classicising or traditional construct of vision; an
other space, where in fact the space 'Iooks back' at the subject. A possible first step in
conceptualising this other space, would be to detach what one sees from what one knows
- the eye from the mind. A second step would be to inscribe space in such a way as to
endow it with the possibility of looking back at the subject. All architecture can be said
to be already inscribed. Windows, doors, beams and columns are a kind of inscription.
These make architecture known, they reinforce vision. Since no space is uninscribed, we
do not see a window without relating it to an idea of window, this kind of inscription
seems not only natural but also necessary to architecture. ln order to have a looking
back, it is necessary to rethink the idea of inscription. ln the Baroque and Rococo such
an inscription was in the plaster decoration that began to obscure the traditional form
of functional inscription. This kind of 'decorative' description was thought too excessive
when undefined by function. Architecture tends to resist this form of excess in a way
that is unique amongst the arts, precisely because of the power and pervasive nature of
functional inscription. The anomalaus column at San Vitale inscribes space in a way that
was at the time foreign to the eye. This is also true of the columns in the staircase at the
Wexner Center, however most of such inscriptions are the result of design intention, the
will of an authorial subjective expression which then only reconstitutes vision as before.
To dislocate vision might require an inscription which is the result of an outside text which
is neither overly determined by design expression or function. But how could such an
inscription of an outside text translate into space?
Suppose for a moment that architecture could be conceptualised as a Moebius
strip, with an unbroken continuity between interior and exterior. What would this mean
for vision? Gilles Deleuze has proposed just such a possible continuity with his idea of
the fold. For Deleuze, folded space articulates a new relationship between vertical and
horizontal, figure and ground, inside and out - all structures articulated by traditional
vision. Unlike the space of classical vision, the idea of folded space denies framing in
favour of a temporal modulation. The fold no Ionger privileges planimetric projection;
instead there isavariable curvature. Deleuze's idea of folding is more radical than origami,
because it contains no narrative, linear sequence; rather, in terms of traditional vision it
contains a quality of the unseen.
Folding changes the traditional space of vision. That is, it can be considered to be
effective; it functions, it shelters, it is meaningful, it frames, it is aesthetic. Folding also
constitutes a move from effective to affective space. Folding is not another subject
expressionism, a promiscuity, but rather unfolds in space alongside of its functioning
and its meaning in space - it has what might be called an excessive condition or affect.
Folding is a type of affective space which concerns those aspects that are not associated
with the affective, that are more than reason, meaning and function.
ln order to change the relationship of perspectival projection to three-dimensional
space it is necessary to change the relationship between project drawing and real space.
This would mean that one would no Iongerbe able to draw with any Ievei of meaningfulness
the space that is being projected. For example, when it is no Ionger possible to draw a line
that stands for some scale relationship to another line in space, it has nothing to do with
 · f the m·1nd to the eye. The deflection from that line in space
reason of t he connect1on o
means,that there no Ionger exists a one-to- one scale corresponden_ ce .
· t e a primitive beginning . ln them the subJeCt understands that
My f o ld ed proJeC s ar . . .
oncept ualise expenence in space in the same way that he or
he or sh e can no Iong er C

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she did in the gridded space. They attempt to provide thi_s dislocation of the subj_ect
from effective space; an idea of presentness. Once the env1ronment becomes affect1ve,
inscribed with another logic or an ur-logic, one which is no Ionger translatable into
the vision of the mind, then reason becomes detached from vision . While we can still
understand space in terms of its function, structure, and aesthetic - we are still within
the ' four walls' - somehow reason becomes detached from the affective condition of the
environment itself. This begins to produce an environment that 'Iooks back' - that is, the
environment seems to have an orderthat we can perceive even though it does not seem
to mean anything. lt does not seek tobe understood in the traditional way of architecture
yet it possesses some sense of 'aura', an ur-logic which is the sense of something outside
of our vision . Yet one that is not another subjective expression. Folding is only one of
perhaps many strategies for dislocating vision - dislocating the hierarchy of interior and
exterior that pre-empts vision.
The Alteka Tower project begins simultaneously with an 'L' shape drawn both in
plan and section . Here, a change in the relationship of perspectival projection to three-
dimensional space changes the relationship between project drawing and real space.
ln this sense, these drawings would have little relationship to the space that is being
projected . For example, it is no Ionger possible to draw a line that stands for some scale
relationship to another line in the space of the project, thus the drawn lines no Ionger
have anything to do with reason, the connection of the mind to the eye. The drawn lines
are folded with some ur-logic according to sections of a fold in Rene Thom's catastrophe
theory. These folded plans and sections in turn create an object, which is cut into from
the ground fioor to the top .
When the environment is inscribed or folded in such a way the individual no Ionger
remains the discursive function; the individual is no Ionger required to understand or
interpret space. Questions such as what the space means are no Ionger relevant . lt is not
just that the environment is detached from vision, butthat it also presents its own vision,
a vision that Iooks back at the individual. The inscription is no Ionger concerned with
aesthetics or with meaning but with some other order. lt is only necessary to perceive
the fact that this other order exists; th is perception alone dislocates the knowing subject.
The fold presents the possibility of an alternative to the gridded space of the
Cartesian order. The fold produces a dislocation of the dialectical distinction between
figure and ground; in the process it animates what Gilles Deleuze calls a smooth space.
Smooth space presents the possibility of overcoming or exceeding the grid. The grid
remains in place and the four wallswill always exist but they are in fact overtaken by the
folding of space. Here there is no Ionger one planimetric view which is then extruded to
Eisenman Architects, Alteka Office Building, Tokyo, 199 1;
provide a sectional space . lnstead it is no Ionger possible to relate a vision of space in a folding diagrams and plan, Ievels five to seven. Courtesy
two- dimensional drawing to the three-dimensional reality of a folded space. Drawing no of Eisenman Architects. © Peter Eisenman.
Ionger has any scale value relationship to the three-dimensional environment. This
dislocation of the two-dimensional drawing from the three-dimensional reality also
begins to dislocate vision, inscribed by this ur-logic. There are no Ionger grid datum
planes for the upright individual.
Alteka is not merely a surface architecture or a surface folding. Rather, the folds
create an affective space, a dimension in the space that dislocates the discursive function
of the human subject and thus vision, and at the same moment creates a condition of
time, of an event in which there is the possibility of the environment looking back at the
subject, the possibility of the gaze .
The gaze according to Maurice Blanchot is that possibility of seeing which remains
covered up by vision. The gaze opens the possibility of seeing what Blanchot calls the
light lying within the darkness. lt is not the light of the dialectic of Iight/dark, but it is
the light of an otherness, which lies hidden within presence. lt is the capacity to see this
otherness which is repressed by vision. The looking back, the gaze, exposes architecture
to another light, one which could not have been seen before.
Architecture will continue to stand up, to deal with gravity, to have 'four walls'. But
these four walls no Ionger need to be expressive of the mechanical paradigm. Rather they
could deal with the possibility of these other discourses, the other affective senses of
sound, touch and ofthat light lying within the darkness.